In South Africa the laborious task of "sweeping' up the
crumbs," rendered all the more difficult by heavy raid and violent storms, is being steadily pursued. Ventersbnrg has shared the fate of Botbaville; General Kitchener, command- ing in Lydenburg, has captured a laager in Steenkampsberg ; General Smith-Dorrien, making a rapid night march from Belfast, surprised a laager at Witkop, but his men were so "perished with cold" that they could not follow up their success ; and further details of the defeat of De Wet by Colonels Lisle and Le Gallais at Rensburg Drift, when five Krupp guns were captured, show that his column narrowly escaped annihilation. Koffyfontein, which was garrisoned by fifty of the Kimberley Light Horse, was relieved on the 2nd after gallantly holding out for nearly a month. At the moment of our going to press we learn of a severe but suc- cessful engagement in which Colonel Le Gallais surprised the Boers under De Wet south of Bothaville, capturing seven guns and a hundred prisoners, and inflicting heavy loss. Our casualty list, unfortunately, was serious, Colonel Le Gallia' himself being among the killed.
